Updates To Gmail's TOS; Twitter Acquires Gnip

Google has frequently been criticized for scanning user inboxes for ad targeting and other purposes. Google counters automated screening is part of the email delivery process. On Monday it updated its Gmail terms of service and one line clearly states that content analysis supports “customized search results, tailored advertising, and spam and malware detection.” Context still reigns in the inbox. Read more via Reuters.

Monetizing The Firehose

The acquisition of social data startup Gnip will help Twitter make its data firehose more actionable to marketers. "We’ll be able to support a broader set of use cases across a diverse set of users including brands, universities, agencies, and developers big and small,” Gnip says in a blog post. Those use cases include layering sentiment and other social data into reporting for digital and offline campaigns -- creating a more holistic view into performance. In related social M&A, Bazaarvoice acquired FeedMagnet for $9 million. More.

Marketing Automation Funding, Cont.

Marketing automation vendor Act-on has raised a $42 million round. CEO Raghu Raghaven said the company tripled from 2012 to 2013, and now serves about 2,200 mid-sized and enterprise clients. Competition could come from cloud marketing companies such as Oracle, Salesforce, Adobe, but these giants often target larger and more expensive clients, creating a mid-market opening for Act-On. Venture Beat has the story.

Licensing Tech

Adaptive Medias, which acquired the remnants of OneScreen after tales of “questionable” traffic were revealed, announced results yesterday for it’s advertising platform business. The company “generated net revenues of $1,030,267 and a net loss of $8,462,981 in 2013.” Read the release. The OneScreen tech is only licensed according to the 10-K report: “On February 12, 2014, (the Company entered into a Management Consulting and Technology License Agreement with OneScreen, Inc. The Agreement provides, among other things, that the Company will provide certain management services and non-exclusively license the intellectual property of the Company’s wholly owned subsidiary, Ember, Inc., to OneScreen in exchange for an 80% share of OneScreen’s net revenue. The Agreement was retroactive to December 1, 2013, and extended through March 31, 2014 with unlimited automatic one-month renewals thereafter.”

Search IQ

Visual IQ and Marin Software have paired to offer joint customers more effective paid search strategies. Agency The Media Kitchen is one such customer, and EVP Caterina Bartoli said the tie-up will help clients“better understand the impact of top-of-funnel marketing activities on lower-funnel paid search metrics.” Press release.